I had a free ticket on American Airlines I could use to go anywhere AA
flies, but there were lots of blackout dates and I had to use it by
April 15, 2005. I only had a week and I did not want to
waste daylight hours in the air. The Atlantic Forest of
Brazil near Sao Paulo fit the bill very nicely. There were
lots of endemic birds. The distances between sites were not
great. I had read a trip report by Mark Lockwood who had
visited Itatiaia and Ubatuba with Edson Endrigo as a guide. I
knew from Mark’s brother Ron, who lives here in the Boston area, that
Mark had been satisfied. I emailed Edson, found mutually
agreeable dates, worked out an itinerary and found two friends, Ted
Raymond of Dedham, MA, and Barbara DeWitt of Plantation, FL, who agreed
to join me on this adventure.

The plan was to spend three nights at Intervales State Park in the
South of Sao Paulo state, two nights at Ubatuba on the coast, and three
nights at Itatiaia National Park in Rio de Janeiro state, about halfway
between Rio and Sao Paulo.

I left Boston on a 2:52 p.m. flight on Tuesday, March 8, 2005, changed
planes in Miami, and arrived in Sao Paulo ahead of the scheduled 6:44
a.m. arrival time. Although I had heard horror stories
about going through customs in Brazil, we flew through and were in the
lobby waiting for Edson at about 7:00 a.m. He arrived at 7:30
a.m., which should have been ample time. He presented each of us
with a photographic guide to the birds of greater Sao Paulo.
Edson is a superb photographer and most, if not all, of the photographs
in the book were his work. He had also prepared a checklist
for us to use throughout the trip. As two of us had
birthdays during the trip, he later gave each of us with a calendar
featuring his photographs.

Edson’s car was a comfortable four door Volkswagen sedan.
He had given us the option of a van with a driver, but thought that we
would make better time with his car. We did.
Edson’s middle name should be “Mario”; he is a fast, but very good,
driver. It took about an hour to get through the city of
Sao Paulo. It was about noon when we got to Intervales with a
quick breakfast stop and a stop at the marsh at Capoa Bonito, about 30
kilometers from Intervales, where I had my first two life birds, a pair
of displaying streamer-tailed flycatchers and a small flock of
yellow-rumped marshbirds.

We got to Intervales at about noon, and before we had the bags out of
the car, had green-chinned euphonia, large-tailed antshrike and the
ferrugineigula subspecies of red-eyed thornbird in the scrub around the
Pousada Pica Pau. After lunch we drove out to the
Carmo Road and the birds came fast and furious: rufous-capped
spinetail; spotted bamboowren; a stunning helmeted woodpecker that
appeared out of nowhere with its funky, punky crest; a rusty-breasted
nunlet – my first nunlet ever; the beautiful and common yellow-fronted
woodpecker; short-tailed antthrush; both pale-browed and sharp-billed
treehunters; ferruginous antbird, whose “tuituwee” call was with us
most of the trip.

By the time we headed back, it was getting dark so we tried for
owls. We heard tropical screech-owl and mottled owl, but
only got the barest of grunts from a rusty-barred owl. Each of
the three nights at Intervales, we stopped to call owls on our way back
to the lodge. We saw mottled and tropical screech, but never got
more than a grunt or two from rusty-barred. There were no
nightjars or nighthawks in evidence except for a very brief appearance
of a short-tailed nighthawk the first night. Apparently
long-trained nightjar can be expected, but it did not happen.

Edson makes excellent use of his tape recorder and was quite successful
in calling in birds. He also has good ears that enable him to use
the tape recorder effectively.

The next two days, March 10 and 11, we followed the same pattern:
breakfast at 5:30 a.m., in the field by six, back for lunch and a
two-hour break, and then bird until after dark.
Thursday, March 10, we returned to the Carmo area in the morning and
birded Bocaina in the afternoon. Morning birding brought us great
looks at white-bearded antshrike; a pair of giant antshrikes although
the male put in only the briefest of appearances; rufous-capped
antshrike; Bertoni’s antbird ; streak-capped antwren; squamate antbird;
scalloped woodcreeper, a recent split from scaled woodcreeper; rufous
gnateater; Oustalet’s and bay-ringed tyrannulets; brown-breasted
bamboo-tyrant; hangnest tody-tyrant, and Temminck’s, and buffy-fronted
seedeaters. At Bocaina, we added white-browed foliage-gleaner,
star-throated antwren, Sao Paulo tyrannulet, a small flock of
three-striped flycatchers, and a pair of black-cheeked gnateaters,
bathing in a streamlet – totally oblivious to the peering eyes
above. We had several good looks at feeding blue-bellied parrots
in the early morning. Pileated parrots were not so
cooperative. Both here and Itatiaia, there were small numbers,
but always too high overhead. On the way back, there was a
rufous-breasted leaftosser, a cooperative slaty-breasted wood-rail in
the road just before dark, and dusky-legged guans at eye level in the
trees along the road as we returned to the lodgings.

On Friday, March 11, we drove out to Barra Grande in the opposite
direction from the lodgings. We had a pair of river
warblers displaying too close to focus by a small pond, with
ochre-faced tody-flycatcher and hooded berryeater both within ear
shot. We saw both. We had been hearing the
berryeater whenever we were in the forest so it was good to finally see
one. We had tufted antshrike, a pair of large-tailed
antshrikes, wing-barred piprites, and gray-headed attila. At an
antswarm, we got a too poor view of a brown tinamou scrambling up a
shrubby bank at our arrival, but better views of white-collared
foliage-gleaner. Back near the lodgings, a sharp-tailed
streamcreeper watched us as we watched a slaty bristlefront, stopping
every so often to sing, sneak in and out of cracks between large
boulders by a forested stream. As night fell, we managed to come
up with a dusky-tailed antbird, but another hard-sought bird,
gray-bellied spinetail appeared nonexistent. The next to
last bird of the day was a white-breasted tapaculo that practically
crawled over my feet without ever letting me see more than a tiny black
blob in the leaf litter. The last bird of the day was a
black-billed scythebill, seen mostly in silhouette, probing a bamboo
trunk for insects. During the lunch break, we had finally
caught up with azure-shouldered tanagers feeding in the fruit trees by
the lodge. They seemed to have been absent and to have just
arrived, because we had been looking for them. A
yellow-billed cuckoo along the trail was the only northern migrant of
the trip. Although there had been reports of black-fronted
piping guan in the Barra Grande area, we did not come across any.

Saturday morning, March 12, 2005, we left after breakfast for the long
ride to Ubatuba with only a few short birding and snacking stops.
We ate well on this trip, and the first stop when we got to Ubatuba
about 1:00 p.m. was at a churrascaria across from the
ocean. Bananaquits and kelp gulls were about the only birds
around.

After checking into the pousada and time for a swim, we drove south to
the Folha Seca trail. The insects were bad! Our
first stop was at a house where the hummingbird feeders were very
active: the large saw-billed hermits and the diminutive festive
coquettes were the highlights for me. White-eyed
foliage-gleaners were common; we were never out of an earshot of the
squeaky rubber toy sound of this bird. We were trolling and
listening for unicolored antwren, but had no luck. Scaled
antwren joined the list of drymophila antbirds. We had good looks
at rufous-capped antthrush and tawny-throated leaftosser. We saw
another slaty bristlefront; Edson told us these coastal birds will be
split from the bird seen at Intervales. After dark, we got a
great look at a tawny-browed owl and heard mottled owl in the
distance. A variable screech-owl was singing its fast trill
very close to us but remained buried in the heavy foliage.

Sunday morning, March 13, 2005, we birded Fazenda Angelim, an area
largely of second growth and open areas. Highlights were
spot-backed antshrike; three buff-bellied purpletufts that came down to
almost eye level to show off their purple tufts with a planalto
tyrannulet and a gray-capped tyrannulet joining us to watch the
display; fork-tailed tody-tyrant; eye-ringed tody-tyrant; the “other
red-eyed thornbird; white-collared foliage gleaner; a displaying
white-bearded manakin with females in attendance, and rufous-winged
antwren. The showy tanagers of the Atlantic Forest were in short
supply; we saw our first red-necked and green-headed tanagers of the
trip. No unicolored antwren.

In the late afternoon we returned to Folha Seca, and saw our first
thrushlike and white-throated woodcreepers of the trip. A
distant unicolored antwren was heard by Edson. We dipped. Again,
the variable screech-owl was singing nearby, probably within five feet
of us, but totally invisible.

Monday, March 14, 2005, we departed after breakfast for Itatiaia via
Pereque about two hours North on a drive with spectacular views of the
bays along this steep coast. At Pereque, we drove inland
following the Paraiba River a few kilometers through disturbed
secondary woodlands in search of the black-hooded antwren, an
endangered formicivora antwren. We found a pair easily in a
scrubby area of grasses and short trees and bushes. Also added on
this detour were chestnut-backed antshrike, rough-legged tyrannulet,
yellow-olive flycatcher, long-billed wren, and lemon-chested greenlet.

We arrived at Itatiaia, with a stop at a marsh by the town of Itatiaia
for tail-banded hornero and yellow-bellied elaenia, in time for
lunch. In the afternoon we birded the grounds and adjoining
trails near the Hotel Simon and the Hotel Donati as well as hummingbird
feeders in the area. We heard white-bibbed
antbird. We saw several dusky-legged guans, including one
perched on a roof top, waiting for the home owner to throw out corn.

Tuesday, March 15, 2005, we left the hotel at 3:45 a.m. to look for a
rusty-barred owl in the upper reaches of the park on the Agulhas Negras
Road. This requires returning to the highway at Itatiaia
for an exit or two and then taking the old road toward Ouro Preto for
about an hour. Once on the Agulhas Negras Road we drove
about ten kilometers, passing two concrete guard rails on the left and
continuing to a spot where the hillside on the left is
grass. If you reach the turn for Casa da. Pedra you have
gone too far. My somewhat quirky altimeter registered 1875
m. It had been raining, but it stopped. We got
out. Edson played the tape and almost immediately there was a
response. The owl flew over our head and landed in a bare
lichen- encrusted tree. We put it briefly in the spotlight,
perched in a vee, framed by pale green and rust lichen.

Then it began to rain again, and I became a bit despondent.
The prediction was for rain all day long. After all we had come
in the rainy season. But the rain stopped and we had a
great day with lots of great birds starting with black and gold
cotinga, rufous-tailed antbird, black-capped-piprites, mouse- colored
tapaculo, serra do mar and greenish tyrannulets; olivaceous elaenia,
robust woodpecker, thick-billed saltator, bay-chested and red-rumped
warbling finches, and plovercrest.

In the higher reaches, we found araucaria spinetails, atop a small
stand of Araucaria trees, and Itatiaia thistletail. As the
road climbs, the habitat changes from moist forest to lower shrubs and
then grassland. The flowers were incredible including one
very beautiful, pale blue flower that I believe to be a bulb and that
resembled one of the narcissus-type daffodils.
Unfortunately, I did not get a good picture, but if anyone has an idea
what it is I would love to know. Where the habitat becomes
grassy, we had a glimpse of a long-tailed reed-finch, but it was a
glimpse that didn’t even rise to “better view desired”
status. Again, there was no sign of gray-bellied spinetail.

That afternoon we had a young male frilled coquette at feeders
down the road from the Hotel Simon.

The last morning, Wednesday, March 16, 2005, we climbed the Tres Picos
Trail near the hotel and caught up with the last drymophila on the
checklist, ochre-rumped antbird, and had a female white-bibbed antbird
(although her bib was ochre) hopping through the ground litter,
stopping to pick an insect from an overhead leaf or off the ground as
we watched. We saw spot-winged wood-quail running by
us, a rufous-tailed antthrush in the path, a pair of blackish-blue
seedeaters in the bamboo, and a stunning black-capped
foliage-gleaner. A Such’s antthrush afforded minimal
views as we followed its progress through the underbrush from the
path. A uniform finch appeared too minimally to make
my list.

Our flight to Miami did not leave from Sao Paulo until 11:55 p.m., and
Edson gave us two choices for the afternoon. One was to go
to Campo do Jordao to look for vinaceous parrot. The other
was to go to a marsh only about 50 kilometers from the airport where a
population of marsh antwren, stymphalornis acutirostris, had recently
been discovered. We opted for the marsh wren.
It turned out to be farther than we had estimated, and “Mario” had to
put on his driving gloves. We got off the highway at Mogi
das Cruzes, drove through the city following signs for McDonald’s, and
then turned off for Biritibi Mirim, another 16 kilometers.
In Biritibi, we stopped to ask directions and were told we had yet
another 20 kilometers to go. It was 5:30 p.m. and getting
dark. However, the turn for Casa Grande was less than 5
kilometers beyond town, but it was a dirt road and we did not know how
far we had to go. Not far, it turns out. The marsh
was only a few hundred yards up the road, and there was a path (no
doubt made by the researchers studying these birds) leading down into
the marsh. Down the path we went almost to the edge of the
cattails. We played the tape.
Nothing. We played it again. We waited.
The grasses moved. A small charcoal gray and dull brown
bird emerged. A few white wing spots, some marbling on the
throat, brown above, charcoal below. A very nice marsh
antwren! And a great bird to the end the trip.

We wound up with 309 species of which I saw 266, and heard another two
that I could recognize by call. Another 20 species were
seen by someone in the group, and there were an 20 additional
heard-only birds, probably heard only by Edson. Especially
on the last day of the trip, we did not try to see every heard bird,
but to get good looks at the birds that were specialties of the area or
life birds. The list includes 44 endemics, 26 antbirds and
29 species on the Birdlife International list. I had 57 life
birds. Despite the fact that this is probably not the best
season to bird this area, as many of the specialties such as
swallow-tailed cotinga and rufous-tailed attila are not present, it was
the time I had and it was a very successful trip.

I have not written much about the habitat but will note that there is
good forest in all three locations that we visited. I don’t know
the tropical tree species, but there were lots of melastomes, bamboo,
tree ferns, and cecropias. The trees were festooned with
moss, lianas and big bromeliads. There were
yellow-flowering and pink-flowering (manaca?) canopy trees.
It was all quite beautiful. At Intervales, there were at three
morpho butterflies: a very large pale blue – almost white, a
smaller electric blue with rusty orange underwings, and another bright
blue with black spotted edgings on the upper wings.
Sweet-smelling white ginger flowers were in bloom in all the forested
areas.

LOGISTICS:

Edson Endrigo, guide, can be contacted at
avesfoto@ig.com.br. Website:
www.avesfoto.com.br

At Intervales State Park, we stayed at the Pousada Pica Pau (Woodpecker
Inn), one of several lodgings inside the park. It was close
to the headquarters at the entrance and even closer to the dining room,
which served breakfast, lunch and dinner, all buffet-style.
The Pica Pau was very nice. Our room had three beds and a balcony
overlooking the swimming pool. On the first floor was a large
parlor with a fireplace and a kitchen. We did not have
air-conditioning and slept with the balcony doors open. The
shower in the bathroom had hot water but it was difficult to adjust; it
was either too hot or not hot enough.
Phone: (55) (15) 3542.1511 or 35421245

In Ubatuba, we stayed at the at the Pousada Recanto das Palmeiras,
which was very nice and had a nice swimming pool. It was two or
three blocks back from the fishing beach where there was a very good
churrascaria with a make-your-own ice cream sundae shop next door.

Phone: (55) (12) 3832.2812
recpalm@iconet.com.br

In Itatiaia National Park, we stayed at the Hotel
Simon, a big old four story rectangle, but very nice with
great birds, fantastic views and the hugest swimming pool I have ever
seen. There was no air-conditioning here, but it was not
needed. We slept with the window wide-open. It
was cool enough at night that I used a light coverlet.

Phone: (55) (24) 3352.1122

FIELD GUIDES

Unfortunately, the only field guide that completely covers the area is All the of Birds of Brazil by
Souza. The illustrations are minimally
adequately. We supplemented with copies of plates made from
various other books including Ridgely & Tudor’s Birds of South
America, vols. 1 & 2, and Handbook of the Birds of World, vols. 1-9.

THE BIRD LIST

The skeleton of this birdlist is from Avisys. I have
included in many cases what I believe to be the subspecies, using
Clements, Avisys, Ridgely and the Handbook of the World as sources, and
would welcome any thoughts or corrections. The place listed
corresponds to the date the bird was first seen followed by other dates
on which the bird was seen. /EN denotes that the bird is an
endemic and I have tried to note that in each case.